The OUSD Historical Writing Assessment: A Focus on Reading, Writing, and
Thinking Historically
Background:
In 1999 a committee of the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) history/social
teachers (K-12) took on the challenging task of developing a set of district-wide
standards. The goal was to provide a concrete guide, in conjunction with the required
topics of study, for the development of engaging and thought-provoking day-to-day
instruction in history classrooms throughout the district. The outcome of that work was
the adoption by the district of a set of K-12 history/social studies standards focused on
five elements of historical thinking:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Chronological/Spatial Thinking
Examining Evidence
Diversity/Multiple Perspectives
Interpretation
Determining Historical/Geographical Significance.
These standards, in keeping with disciplinary requirements of historical investigation,
support the development of students’ historical understanding as they inquire into the
meaning and significance of historical events and individuals. (The OUSD historical
thinking standards can be accessed through a link on this website.)
In 2002, a second committee of OUSD high school history teachers began to investigate
how a district-wide assessment program might support the integration of these
standards into high school history classrooms across the district. In the spring of 2004,
at the end of two year pilot program, OUSD high school history/social studies teachers
voted to implement a district-wide, document based, writing assessment for students in
10th grade World History and 11th grade U.S. History. The adopted assessment
program requires students to write to common, centrally developed, assessment
questions twice each school year. The goal of this work is threefold: 1) to improve
student ability to construct a coherent and thoughtful historical essay that uses primary
and secondary sources to support an historical argument; 2) to enhance student and
teacher knowledge and understanding of key issues and questions in World and
American history; and 3) to promote equity across the district through common scoring
sessions and staff development; ensuring that what constitutes quality work in one
teacher’s classroom is comparable to what constitutes quality work in another teacher’s
classroom.
Implementation:
A pool of six questions, tied to the California State History Standards for 10th World
History and 11th Grade U.S. History, has been developed to focus this work. The six
questions, three related to fall semester topics and three related to spring semester
topics, are rotated yearly. It is important to note that this assessment program is
designed to support both student and teacher learning and success. With this in mind,
teachers are provided the assessment questions, but not the source documents, well
before the assessment is given so they can shape their instruction to support thoughtful
student responses. Using the questions and knowledge of their students’ academic skill
levels as jumping off points, teachers design instructional materials to promote historical
understanding and specific historical reading, writing, and thinking skills.
The district also provides professional development for teachers that supports a deep
analysis of the student work produced on these assessments and the development of
responsive instructional materials. In addition, developed a series of instructional support
materials tied to specific assessment questions have been developed for teachers and
students. These materials are focused on supporting student success by providing them
the opportunity to work with the actual assessment questions and related sources before
actually writing the essay. Like the work of individual teachers, the support materials
also focus on the areas of historical writing and historical thinking identified as
challenging for students. Much of this analysis of student work takes places at our
district wide scoring sessions where representative samples of student papers are read
and discussed. Key questions addressed at these scoring sessions include:
1. What additional content knowledge and/or concepts would be helpful for students
to know in order to write more successful essays? What patterns do you see?
2. What strengths and weaknesses do you notice in the student writing?
3. Are there any patterns of student misperceptions that you notice?
The assessment questions (subject to revision and change) are listed at another link on
this webpage. Underneath the questions are links to support materials designed to
support student success. These materials are posted in a Microsoft Word format so
individual teachers can modify them for their specific students and classroom context.
The OUSD History/Social Studies Department welcomes your feedback on these
materials, and examples of revisions or refinements that enhance student learning in
classrooms within and beyond the district.